The World According to Children, Part 1

I really don't think I'm biased in saying my kids are extraordinarily funny. I have so many good quotes, I had to divide them into a blog series.

JULIANA, 5 YEARS

While pregnant with Nadia.

Me: Right now, baby is the size of a carrot.

Juliana: A carrot?? I've never seen a carrot come out of someone's belly.

Me: No, that's just how big it is.

J: The carrot's brother or sister?

Me: No, the baby.

J: The baby carrot?

Me: No! carrots grow in the ground. I'm just talking about the size of the baby.

J: So it's a person baby?

Me: Yes!

J: Oh...I knew it was a person baby. I just thought its name was carrot.

 

JULIANA, 4 YEARS

Juliana: I will marry God and then I will be a princess.

Me: You mean a nun?

Juliana: I will marry daddy and then I will be a princess.

Kevin: I'm already married to mama.

Juliana: It's okay. You can stop being married to her and then you can marry me.

(a few minutes later) How will I know if someone loves me? I think you and mama can find someone for me to marry.

Kevin: You might change your mind about an arranged marriage, but we can help you to know if someone really loves you.

Juliana: EVERYONE loves me.

 

JULIANA, 3 YEARS

Juliana: Moo, moo, moo.

Mama: Are you a cow?

Juliana: No, I'm a girl who says 'moo.' 

 

JULIANA, 4 YEARS

Juliana, struggling with her clothes: "I'm trying to get my shirt tucked into my pants, but it just won't LISTEN to me! "'

 

JULIANA, 3 YEARS 

Juliana: Yaya! I'm making your stairs beautiful!

(as she puts Mickey Mouse stickers on the stairs)  

Me: The stairs might not be the best place for stickers.

Juliana with shocked expression: You don't want beautiful stairs? Yes you do!

 

JULIANA, 5 YEARS

Did you know you can eat ice that's clean? Did you know that? I ate ice once. But it was a long time ago. #thirdculturekid

 

NADIA, 5 YEARS

Nadia to Adalyn: 

How do you spell mama? 

How do you spell dada?

How do you spell stop? 

How do you spell George Washington?

 

NADIA, 2 YEARS 

Desert book: "What do you think of when you think of the desert?"

Nadia: "Um...Pandas!!"

Desert book: "desert, desert, desert..."

Nadia: "Where's the pandas?"

 

NADIA, 3 YEARS 

Finishing Nadia's birthday cake.

Me: My arm is so sore from mixing.

Nadia: My arm is so sore from tasting.

 

ADALYN, 8 YEARS

Adalyn, whispering to mama: The secret message is "Valentine’s card break."

Nadia: I heard you! You said valentines. And you said break. "

Adalyn: No, I was talking about something else. I said Barack. I said I wonder what Barack Obama is doing for Valentines Day.

 

JULIANA, 8 YEARS

Driving to the store with just Juliana.

Juliana: It's pretty nice to have only one kid in the car. It's much calmer, isn't it? I can hear the songs on the radio. I like that. It's nice to have some peace and quiet." ... [talks continuously the rest of the way]

NADIA, 3 YEARS

When our plane was taking off to fly back to China, I suggested Nadia say goodbye to America. She said, "Bye bye America! Bye bye America! [perturbed] It's not saying goodbye back to me!!"

 

NADIA, 5 YEARS 

Me: "There's no place like home."

Nadia: That's not true. There are SOME places like home.

Me: It means that home is the best place to be.

Nadia: Well, I think Chuck-E-Cheese is the best place to be.

 

JULIANA, 3 YEARS 

Juliana outside on the swing: "Hi shadow, how are you today? I'm fine. Shadow, what did you do beautiful today?"

 

ADALYN, 7 YEARS

There is a pop song the girls like that says, "I like me better when I'm with you."

Today Adalyn was singing, "I like everyone better when I'm alone." 

She has a point.

 

ADALYN, 1.5 YEARS

Adalyn standing next to me as I was cutting up a banana for her oatmeal: "I'm sorry 'nana!"

 

ADALYN, 8 YEARS 

I just found the best thing in my life - this wrapping paper roll!

 

JULIANA, 3 YEARS

Juliana at lunch: I was glabroabua...

Me: We can't understand you when your mouth is full.

(A few minutes later)

Me: Juliana, I need you to sit back down and finish eating.

Juliana: I can't understand you because my mouth is full.

 

NADIA, 5 YEARS

Nadia: What's this?

Me: It's a card from a friend, saying they are sorry that Anna died.

Nadia: Why are they sorry? They didn't kill her.

 

JULIANA, 7 YEARS

Packing to move, the girls discovered a bag of throwaways.

Juliana: You can’t get rid of this! I’ve been looking for it! It’s my favorite!!

Me: It’s a hanger.

 

JULIANA, 4 YEARS

Juliana, looking at her Barbie backpack: Who is that?

Me: Maybe Cinderella?

Juliana: NO! it's Barb...eque.

 

ADALYN, AGE 6

Adalyn: Barbies are different from people. Because Barbies can turn their heads all the way around.

 

JULIANA, 2.5 YEARS 

Juliana's expert travel advice: "You ride on an airplane. You ride on a train. You drive on a bus. If you touch trash you get sick. If you don't sit in your seat you go CRASH fall down. And then you go waa-waa!"

 

ADALYN, 8 YEARS

You know the best time to kiss someone (on the lips)? When your lips are dry. 

 

NADIA, 4 YEARS 

Nadia: Do we have a xylophone here?

Me: I think so. It's a little different from the one in China though.

Nadia: WE DIDN'T BRING OUR XYLOPHONE??

 

ADALYN, 8 YEARS

Today we didn't wear masks to church for the first time in a long time, so I put on some lipstick in the car. As I was blotting it with a tissue, Adalyn said, "Oh no, do you have a bloody nose?" I guess it's been a while. 

 

JULIANA, 2.5 YEARS

Me: Do you want banana in your Chex (cereal)?

Juliana: I want...I want a CAKE in my Chex.

 

 

NADIA, 3 YEARS; ADALYN, 5 YEARS 

(jetlagged) 

4:30am trying to get Nadia to go back to sleep:

N, screaming at the top of her lungs, "IT'S BORING TO SLEEP!!"

 

9:30am trying to get Adalyn to put clothes on:

A, lying on the stairs wailing dramatically, "I hate paaaaaants!!"

 

JULIANA, 2 YEARS 

Juliana has taken to asking and answering the questions she thinks we should be asking her. In her imaginary world we give her everything she wants.

Juliana: "Do you want another cracker? Okay! Another cracker!!"

 

JULIANA, 5 YEARS 

Kevin: I have ancestors from Sweden, and Norway, and Netherlands.

Juliana: NEVERLAND??

 

 

The Year Nothing Feels Right

Much as I theoretically love the Christmas season, past Decembers have often been hard - sickness and depression and polluted skies and exhaustion. This year we haven't been sick too much, the air is clear, and thanks to modern medicine, my depression is improving.

But still.

This year nothing feels right.

Grief pierces unexpected moments in the midst of ordinary life.

Decorating trees and

viewing lights and

– loss –

and singing songs and

baking cookies and

– loss -

joy and grief

and confusion

and heaviness and

– loss –

---

We went to my parents’ house to help them decorate because there is nothing like the excitement of children to make these things feel worthwhile. We hung all of Anna’s personal ornaments collected since childhood. They blended in amid all the others, just like always.

Then mom pulled out the stockings. We each have personalized stockings my mom made over the years for children, sons-in-laws, grandchildren, cousins and grand-cousins. This year we finally have ours shipped from China. All of the stockings are together at last!

She looked at Anna’s stocking and stopped. “What do we do with this? We can’t not put it up.” For 32 years, that stocking hung on the mantle with the rest of the family’s. So many years ago mom carefully stitched the name “Anna” in sequins.

In that moment, the wrongness of it all broke through again. How do we have this stocking that Anna will never again open? She can’t just be gone. How does someone just cease to exist on earth? It shouldn’t be this way.

---

As I strung the tree with lights, the girls exclaimed over the ornaments. Juliana said, “Hey look at this funny ornament!” She was holding up the ridiculous brocolli-as-a-Christmas-tree picture that Anna once found in a magazine when we were kids. We both thought it was so funny that she made it into an ornament for me.

Every year for many years I asked for a harp for Christmas even though I knew I wouldn’t get it. One year Anna worked with my grandfather in his workshop to make me a “harp” from wood and guitar strings. She knew what I really wanted and her six year old self tried to make it come true.

As children we would say, “Christmas is two months away!” and then, “Christmas is two weeks away!! Remember when it was still two months away?” and we laid in bed at night talking about how slowly time moved.

We paged through the giant Sears catalog and decided which toys we wanted most. We searched for the hidden stash of presents (usually in mom’s closet) and argue over who was getting which toy.

I remember standing at the top of the stairs, waiting for the “okay” to come down and see the Christmas tree. Anna had kept her secret for so long she just couldn’t handle it any more and told me what my present was.

We missed a lot of adult Christmases during our years in China, but when we were there, she worked to make it special for the girls. She put up a tree in their room and bought – or made! - matching Christmas jammies.

I celebrated 21 Christmases with Anna. All of my memories of Christmas with my family are wrapped up with her.

-----

When we visited Santa at Bass Pro Shop the day after Thanksgiving (I did not think that through), I really wanted to text Anna.

“We are stuck in line behind this very talkative lady who doesn’t believe in the vaccine and thinks the hospitals are getting paid to fake virus cases and it’s all a conspiracy by the Chinese government and oh my gosh it’s been 30 minutes of this!!”

“Juliana is totally (nicely) giving it back and challenging everything this lady says with, “but actually…” and I am so proud of my child right now.”

“Now she is saying something about paying on your phone as a sign of the end of times??”

And Anna would have texted back about how people are stupid and Juliana is awesome and also WTF?? I can predict almost exactly how she would have responded.

---

This year I decided to make Christmas cookies for ALL the people. Somehow the list morphed into 34 people/families/groups. It’s one of those decisions I made when I wasn’t thinking so clearly, and I wonder, “WHY did I chose this year of all years?” 

Some days I enjoy mixing up cookie dough and doing all the Christmas things. I am actually happy, plugging in the Christmas tree lights every day and sitting by the fire. I feel energized watching the girls' Christmas performance.

Other days, I feel like I am dying. I am so emotionally exhausted that my body hurts. I wonder how I will be able to press through all the way through Christmas. I wonder why I am putting all my energy into making cookies while the laundry piles up, the dining table has been practically inaccessible, and I’ve resorted to “I don’t know, just find something” dinner.

I guess I need to expect the unpredictable ups and downs. I try to save some energy for those days I feel like death. I try to give myself grace in this year instead of guilt over not doing all the things. Sometimes I am successful.

I just wish I had Anna to say, "Yeah, I don't know what you were thinking. Did you make some that are allergy friendly? Gluten free? Vegan? Nut free? That's important. And did you make some for me? 😀"

I Used to Have That in China

Five months and nine days after we entrusted our most important belongings to the postal service, our final package arrived!

When we unwittingly left China in January 2020, planning to be back in a few weeks, we brought beach clothes. We left an entire house set up and waiting, perfectly preserved as a moment in time: Beds made, clothes folded in drawers, shoes by the doors.

Once we realized we were settling in America and would not be able to return to China anytime in the near future, we started looking into options for shipping a few of our most important possessions back from China.

It was a long and arduous process including months of planning and frustration, and incredibly helpful friends who spent hours and hours gathering and packing and repacking on the China side. On June 6^th, five boxes and one bass guitar finally left Yinchuan. Due to the nightmarish shipping delays, they sat in Shanghai for three months.

Finally in mid-October, the first boxes started arriving! A month later we were still waiting for the final package. The last tracking update was June, and I was starting to lose hope. But yesterday, our shipping saga concluded; all our belongings have safely made their way across the ocean!!

We were all so excited to be reunited with our things again. The girls exulted over Barbies, stuffed animals, and seemingly random “treasure collections.” I was thrilled to see the handmade afghans and stockings and embroidered pictures, the little books I had filled with baby memories, and old journals that told the inner story of years in China.  Practical things like favorite winter clothes arrived just in time for cool weather, with a big jumble of jewelry and electronics.

I was very happy to see all these things after nearly two years. But emotions are rarely pure and uncomplicated. In the midst of the happiness, I felt letdown. I found myself picturing where each of these things were in our apartment. The recipe cards in the pantry, my jewelry on a hook in my wardrobe, the Little People overflowing their milk-box-turned-toy-storage.

For a whole year, I pictured my China home set up and waiting. I thought about all the special and useful things I wished I had with me. Now, I am faced with the reality that the home we never said goodbye to is gone forever.  I already knew that. Knowing that brought a bit of closure, a sense that I could start to move on. 

But now it is real in a new way. My hair-tie inexplicably smells like our apartment, a familiar scent of chalky walls. The physical evidence of our presence in China is gone, as if we never lived there. The last tangible connection to our past life is severed.

The dismantling of our apartment symbolizes the unraveling of our whole lives in China. Even if we did go back to China, everything would be different. Our dear friends and the sweet community we formed would be gone. Our students would have graduated and moved on.  Who knows which of our favorite shops and restaurants actually survived the pandemic. The China we miss no longer exists.

These five boxes encompass 15 years of life. Most of our things are more recent, post-children possessions, but they also hold reminders of years past, the early days when China was such a different world. A handmade “wish jar” from my very first class in Yangzhou now sits on my dresser. I loved them so dearly, and they were enamored with me, their 22 year old teacher, the first foreigner many of them had ever seen.

We shipped another wish jar, full of intricate hand-folded paper hearts, from two shy students in Weinan, ones who said they were so touched by Kevin’s teaching because they had never before been complimented.

An angel figurine that was once on our bookshelf now rests on the mantel, a memorial of our first pregnancy that ended in miscarriage in a Chinese hospital. The paper IKEA gift tags that Kevin and I used to decorate our first Christmas tree wait with the handmade stockings my mom sewed for each new addition to the family.

I look at my painting, now torn, and remember the painting class I took with friends. The mug from my favorite coffee shop reminds me of quiet moments alone, deep connections with friends, and the best ever hugs from the owner. The terra cotta warrior figurines remind us of bargaining down the ridiculous price quoted at a stall outside this historical landmark. I remember where we got every single one of these items and why they are important.

And now we have them back. These tangible reminders of our lives in China are scattered around the house, slipped between newer items of this newer life.  Our past and present lives blend together a little more. While it sometimes seems like a dream, like another world entirely, China will always always be inextricably woven into the rest of our lives. We look at these treasures and remember who we are.

The Days after Death

I have been thinking a lot about what my cousin told me a number of years ago. She had just lost her mom, my aunt, and I had just suffered a miscarriage. She told me that everyone grieves differently and no matter what other people expect of you, there is not a right way to grieve.

We have an idea of what grief should look like. Crying. Lots of crying.  But grief is much more complicated. Dull sadness and sharp pain, fog and feeling lost, irritation and rage- it shouldn’t be this way!, numbness, memories, tears, exhaustion.

I don’t cry much in general, and I sometimes wonder if I look sad enough. I cried when we gathered around Anna’s hospital bed, when she was both dying and already gone at the same time. But I didn’t cry at the memorial. I sat dry-eyed thinking, “This isn’t real.” It seemed so much like Anna that surely she was there.

The grief pendulum swings back and forth between surreal and all-too-real. Sometimes life seems normal and I think about other things. Laugh and work on my to-do list and forget. Other moments I bow under the weight of this finality, all of the life I lived with Anna and all that Anna was, suddenly gone.  

I think when a person is close enough, their loss is so big it can’t be grasped at once. If we tried to take in the enormity all at once, we might shatter into a thousand pieces. I feel the need to wrap my arms around myself so nothing falls out.

***

If you have ever lost someone close, you know the days after death are a crazy mess of details and logistics. Death certificate, obituary, talking to the funeral home, choosing a coffin or urn (or in this case, a biodegradable earth ball), preparing for the memorial. The people with the most grief have the least amount of time to feel it.

When it is all over, when everyone else is understandably moved on, when life moves on and you are expected to do all the things you did before, that’s when the reality sets in. Walking around the grocery store with a broken heart, folding laundry with heavy arms, trying to cook with a muddled mind. We no longer even wear black as a sign we are mourning. We all walk around looking just the same, as if death never happened, as if we aren’t broken inside. 

***

It has been such a long, slow loss. I started saying goodbye to Anna a few years ago, when she started talking to me about her death.  I think everyone close to Anna knew it was coming, we just didn’t know exactly when. The idea of her inevitable death - and even the grief - have been a part of life for long enough that in some strange way, I can grieve her death without fully grasping that she is not alive anymore.

Of course, even when you know it is coming, you can never really be prepared. Two days before she died, I sat in the hospital with Anna talking about all kinds of random things, as we typically did. The quality of various hospital rooms she had stayed in. My new neighbors’ tree massacre. Orthodontics. Nobody thinks your last conversation will be about braces, but I don’t regret it. I don’t regret the normalcy.  

I helped her organize her things, in hopes they would release her the next day.

***

Even as we prepared for her memorial, I thought, “Anna would know who the person in this picture is; I should ask her.”  I wanted her to know that I wore her hat and dress and scarf and earrings to the memorial. She wouldn’t have been surprised, because I wore all her clothes at Easter too. But she would have been surprised that over 1000 people watched her memorial – that is the impact one short, limited life can make.

Anna would have been happy to see how the girls are taking care of her tubie bunny and draining its feeding tube. She would have laughed about Nadia’s gleeful face when she said, “Maybe now we will get her candy!!” I would have told her about when Nadia woke up one morning and asked, “Does Anna remember us in heaven?”

I knew these things were all happening because of her death, but it still seemed that I ought to be able to tell her.

I constantly think of things I want to tell Anna. I momentarily forget I can’t message her like I used to do all the time.

“For superhero night at church, the girls dressed up as Malala and Susan B. Anthony! I’m so proud.”

“My phone has finally started predicting swearing!”

“Are you offended that Nadia’s memorial plant died, or is that an appropriate symbol?”

I feel a knife jab as I remember I can’t send these messages.  Apparently we talked a lot, because every day I think of things Anna said. 

I hear her voice in my kitchen: “Actually people’s sinks are the dirtiest places because they don’t clean them often.”

In my closet, now full of her clothes: “Almost all my clothes are black because stains don’t show.”

At the coffee shop: “They have this handicap space, but there wouldn’t be enough room to get a wheelchair up this sidewalk.”

My life is filled with reminders of her. Lately, this is how her being dead seems most different from her being alive.

***

I cannot wish her back to these last months, when her life got harder and harder, when staying alive became all-consuming.  In that sense, I’m glad she didn’t have to make the choice about when to stop fighting. 

I think back to before TPN, before a feeding tube, when she could eat all kinds of food and shower whenever she wanted and was not connected to any lines. I think back to when she could sit on the floor with the girls, could climb the stairs, didn’t even own a wheelchair or IV pole. There was a time when she could watch TV, when she could drive, when she could even live on her own. I grieve not just for her death but for all the life that she slowly lost.

***

It has been one month since we stood at her bedside, holding her hands as her life slipped away. Only a month, and already a month. How have we been living normal life for a month, a normal life that looks different from all the months before it? How can she really be gone?

One month ago the reality unfolded. The following days may seem hazy, but I remember the details of that day. 

The messages: She is not responding. The MRI shows a major stroke. Your sister is driving down from North Carolina. Come now. 

Sitting on our bed, the girls crying, “But maybe she will wake up. Maybe she will be okay.” Holding Juliana and telling her, “No. This is it.”  

Telling the woman at registration I was going to the ICU. When she said, “I hope it will be okay!” I didn’t tell her that, no, it won’t be.

Taking off my mask – the RBG mask Anna bought me – to blow my nose with tiny tissues, then quickly putting it back on again, over and over.”

Asking the nurse to remove all the IVs and lines and tubes because Anna finally no longer needed them.

One month ago, Anna died. The days keep coming and keep coming. The distance from that day will become greater and greater, as Anna stays frozen in time, ever 33. But also not. She is all the ages she was before and all that she never got to be. She is free from tubes and wires and medications and thank God, from insurance. She is everything she was meant to be. And while no-one really knows how it all works, yes Nadia, I think she remembers us.

Our American Dream Home

We have now lived in our America house for 6 months! There are still moments when I think, “How is this our house? How do we actually live here, in America, in this house that we own?” But overall we do feel settled. Amazingly settled, actually, for starting out with no furniture and a few boxes of our own things.

We really liked this house and it “checked the boxes.” The biggest deciding factor (for me) was all the old trees. I am in love with big, old trees. Six months in, I still feel like we absolutely made a good choice. There are very few things I don’t like about the house and very many things I do.

Location

- We live in a 50 year old neighborhood with lots of old trees (I’m not into new subdivisions, especially when they raze the trees. It’s an abomination), a quiet road for walks and bike-rides.

- Our house is 4 minutes from the girl’s school and 10 minutes from Kevin’s. We are 5 minutes from all the stores – Kroger, Publix, Target, Walmart, Home Depot, Sam’s Club, The Dollar Tree, Starbucks...Aldi is the furthest at about 7 minutes away. There are also a ton of restaurants, which we of course have not yet been to.

- We are 25 minutes away from my parents, 8 minutes from church, 10 minutes from friends, 15 minutes from 5+ good parks, and 10 minutes from 2 good libraries. I really miss being able to walk/bike places, but just like China we rarely have to venture out of our little radius.

Outside

- Our house is situated on ½ acre of grass and trees with a fenced in backyard. Did I mention the trees?

- We have a front porch and back screened-porch. My warm-weather dilemma is which one to choose for morning coffee.

- On cold or rainy days, we drive our cars into the garage, literally a few feet from the door, completely protected from the elements. No more lugging groceries up 5 flights of stairs.

- Unlike an apartment, we have no downstairs neighbors to quietly hate us when the girls run, jump, scream, cry, fight, bounce, and play the floor is lava.

Inside

- We have TWO BATHROOMS. 

- Our kitchen has a full-size refrigerator, a large oven, and a dishwasher. Enough said.

- We can sit on the couch by the gas fireplace, which is much cozier than a fireplace recording on the TV.

- The girls are now split between two rooms. Adalyn enjoys having her own room and the other girls are happy to still have company.



- Our bedroom is large enough to walk all the way around the bed. No more crawling in from the bottom.

- We not only have a giant washer AND dryer, we have this fantastic laundry room. It is big enough to double as a mud room and food-storage room.


- An attic and a basement – and closets! No more suitcase storage on top of cabinets.

- We have a finished basement room for an office/school area/play area. There was also a perfect nook by the basement stairs for Kevin to build a two-story playhouse with a slide.

- We initially told our agent no split-levels and then of course we bought one, and I actually really like it. There is a feeling of separation between the downstairs and the bedrooms, but only 4 steps between them. I appreciate this when running up and down (4) stairs all day.

It has many features I only dreamed about in China. A dishwasher!! A dryer and an entire room to put it in. A washer, fridge, and oven that are twice the size of our China ones. Hot water in all the sinks. Even the bathrooms have closets. Central A/C!! Adjustable heat. The ability to step outside the door and – bam – you’re outside. Enough space that the kids sometimes can’t find me for at least 1 minute. 

This is not the time or the way I imagined buying a house in America, but I’m so glad we found this house, during just the right 30hr window it was on the market. We will always think fondly on our various China homes, even the roach infested one (see below). But I have to admit, this one is a pretty good upgrade. I’m glad we have found a permanent (?) America dream home.

Our last China apartment that was our home for five years

Our apartment full of roaches, mold, and fond memories